Fertility and the Number Problem
The world's population now stands at 5.8 billion people. Over half, or 60 percent to be exact, live in Asia, whose own population is expected to grow another 1.5 billion persons by the year 2025. Population trends in Asia therefore exert a huge impact on the global environment and on food supplies. Differently stated, the core of Asia's population problem is the the "number problem," so the only solution lies in reducing fertility and encouraging a fertility transition.
For this purpose, many countries have, with the assistance of United Nations and other international agencies, introduced family planning programs, offered training in contraception, and distributed contraceptive devices. These earnest efforts have yielded significant, but hardly rapid, results.
Forcible means have been employed as well. One example would be the attempts by the late Prime Minister Indira Ghandi of India to make use of compulsory sterilization operations, but China's "one-child" policy represents an even larger-scale effort to forcibly limit fertility.
Lessons from History
If we view population growth in historical perspective, it becomes apparent that such repressive policies are based on simplistic thinking.
(1) The basic concept in this regard is called Demographic Transition Theory, meaning a transition from the pattern of high birth and death rates to one of low birth and death rates. One premise for the theory is that people in the past knew nothing about contraception so that their fertility reached its biologically maximum possible level.
However, historical research has shown this premise to be incorrect. For example, in premodern England, marriage served as a means of what Malthus called a "preventive" check on population size. Moreover, in many so-called "backward" societies, cultural and religious systems had considerable success in increasing birth intervals.
There are very few countries in Asia for which it is possible to estimate past total fertility rates, or the number of babies to which a woman might give birth when she is between the ages of twenty and fifty. In no part of Asia, however, did the rate reach 8 to 9 births per woman. Including Tokugawa Japan, rates were in the range of 5 to 6 at most.
(2) At the beginning of the era of modern economic growth, birthrates began to rise in a number of areas. In England, for example, the birthrate rose as the average age of marriage declined. Moreover, in Germany, one result of urbanization and modernization was that mothers breastfed their children less often, so more children were nursed with artificial milk. As a result, birth intervals decreased and a rise in the birthrate was observed. For different reasons, in nineteenth-century Japan, there was a slight but unmistakable increase in fertility.
What does this point mean for Asia? There is some research suggesting that marital fertility increases among couples in Asia before the commencement of a fertility transition. Although factors affecting this change are not yet well understood, it is quite possible that the social changes which accompany economic development generate upward pressure on birthrates.
(3) Another key element in demographic transition theory is mortality, especially for children. In general, we know from experience that a decline in fertility is preceded by a decline in child mortality (the number of deaths per 1000 births of persons five years of age). Stated the other way around, if the level of fertility should decrease, then the mortality rate, especially for children, must also decrease.
On the other hand, however, historical experience teaches us that a decline in infant mortality does not automatically result from economic development and urbanization. Though the mortality rate for children aged one year or more may steadily decline, the infant mortality rate (the number of deaths per 1000 births of persons less than one year old) may level off after an initial decline and has, in some cases, even risen. In addition, it has not been unusual for the mortality rate for the 1-to-12-month-olds to increase while that for infants less than one month old declines as the former group is particularly vulnerable to any worsening of living environments. These factors typically include changing disease environments caused by economic transformation, a deterioration in housing conditions, or the growth of slums in urbanizing areas. Therefore, governments must look after the health of infants and mothers if they are to implement family planning programs without opposition.
Contrasting Cases: India and China
Both India and China are countries with large populations, but they have witnessed different trends during the last half century. In both countries, total fertility during the 1950s and early 1960s was still around 6, but by 1992 it had fallen to 4 in India and to 2 in China (see Table A).
However, the large difference cannot be attributed entirely to government policy. A downward trend in birthrates had begun in China from the beginning of the 1970s, prior to the implementation of the one-child policy, while infant and child mortality had begun to fall even earlier. Immediately after World War II, the infant and child mortality rates were higher in China than in India, but now the opposite situation holds (Tables B and C).
Of even greater interest is the fact that there were major differences between North and South in India. In contrast to the North, where family planning made little progress, Southern states such as Kerala exhibited a fall in birthrates even greater than in China. The cultural differences between North and South are considerable, and in the former the status of women has traditionally been low, and even today, infanticide is practiced against young girls. In contrast, the women of Southern India, like the women of Southeast Asia, play important roles in agriculture and other productive activities, and their status within the household is not low. Specialists believe that this difference in status exerts a decisive influence on reproductive activities.
The status of women appears to have been a key factor fostering the difference in performances between India and China. Table D shows that there has been a conspicuous gap in education of girls between the two countries. On the whole, the Chinese Communist government's investment in universal primary education has done more to reduce birthrates than its repressive one-child policy.
India and China Compared
| A. Total Fertility Rate | C. Mortality Rate, Children Under 5 years of Age | D. Primary School Enrollment Rate(%), Females | |
| India China
1965-70 5.7 6.0 1985-90 4.2 2.4 1992 3.9 2.2 |
India China
1945 151 204* 1960 144 140 1992 83 35 |
India China 1960 236 209 1992 124 43 |
India China 1960 44 90 1986-91 83 100** |
* 1944-49.
** There are varying definitions in the two countries.
Conclusion
Infant mortality rates more closely reflect "true" standards of living than wage levels or per capita GNP. Viewed from the perspective of a "numbers game," lowering the death rates of mothers and children may result in a short-term increase in population, but such progress is essential to achieving long-term success in population policy.
Osamu Saito
Hitotsubashi University, Institute of Economic Research